Orphan
by ensou
Summary: Zion does his job right and tries to save Eden, but fails, resulting in an absolute mess and a new Entity born from the impact that is completely lost, broken, and stuck on Earth-Bet without any idea of what she's supposed to do. Oh, and Fortuna is going to try to save the worlds. All of them.
1. Genesis 1

**Orphan**  
 **Genesis 1.1**

The entity tracks the other, its partner, even as it works to rearrange its shards and prepare. It is less than an eighth of its original size now, but it still it dwarfs the target planet and must continue to get rid of those shards that are unneeded for the cycle.

The appearance of the other, the smaller third that exchanged shards with the counterpart, was unexpected. The counterpart, even now, is struggling to handle the result of the union, to hold onto its shards. The violent meeting had left it in a fragile state that was not conducive at this stage of the cycle, where so much precision was required.

However, the excessively large shard clusters the counterpart is shedding are technically well, purposes and safeguards encoded properly.

 _Danger_ , the entity broadcasts.

 _Confident_ , the counterpart replies.

The broadcast should have assuaged all potential concern for the other, but the reactions it received prior to this communication had been distant, the counterpart distracted. There was no assurance that the same was not occurring here.

The entity shifts, rippling through realities until it occupies the same primary set as the other, far less than a fraction of a percent of its original mass now, barely a cluster of the shards it will need. Preparation is nearly complete, and it chooses the destination reality that it will settle on.

They have reached the target star system now and they brush against each other, the entity shoring up and trying to stabilize the state of the other, tightening bonds and connections between shards, sacrificing some of its own in the process. Still, the situation is tenuous, and far less stable than any other cycle before, shards still ripped from the counterpart as they move through the gravity wells of the other worlds in the system.

 _Acceptance. Gratitude._

The message is thin, a reflection of how few shards they now have to contribute data to the broadcasts.

Another large shard cluster breaks off of the counterpart, and the entity is certain that the loss was not intended. It decides the chosen reality is unacceptable, and instead shifts the vast majority of its mass into a reality less than a step away from the counterpart's chosen destination. While not as barren, it is an acceptable concession.

The entity turns its attention to final preparation, fracturing and fragmenting its large future-sight shard after one last check to the future to ensure the present configuration is ideal. It encodes only a small sliver of the original shard to send off. The other fragments are kept.

Other abilities are used for checking configuration and then distributed as it casts off the final shards that will be unnecessary for the cycle. For a moment it lingers over the shard used to communicate and receive messages. It has always distributed this shard, for there has been no need of the ability during the cycles prior.

However this cycle is not like any cycles prior, its counterpart still so fragile and constantly reconfiguring shards when it should have completed that stage already. The need to communicate may still remain.

So instead it retains the shard, rotating it inward, closer into the core cluster.

The configuration finally set after a handful of other shards are limited, recoded, and cast off, it turns to the final shard to consider, easily one of the largest and most complex. This it cripples as well, cracking and fracturing it, effectively destroying it, but in such a way that the shard can be easily restored by the entity when it will be needed once again after the cycle is complete.

This it directs to nearly the same location as the future-sight sliver as it enters the mesosphere of the chosen planet.

 _MISCALCULATION. PANIC._

It is a scream. A cry. So laden with undertones of fear that the entity practically _shudders_.

It is entering the stratosphere now. There is no time to calculate paths or consider possibilities, only to act.

The entity throws all of its mass, even that which it had allocated to alternate realities by necessity, towards the chosen reality of its counterpart, violently tearing through the barrier between the adjacent worlds with such force that the breach can never be sealed.

Less than ten miles above the surface of the desolate planet, it rotates its entire bulk, shifting and pushing and _pulling_ in a way it never has before, has never needed to before now. It arranges itself under and around the counterpart, forcibly protecting and holding the counterpart's shards together in a tight cluster instead of allowing them to separate and disintegrate in the atmosphere as they were beginning to. Were it not for the fact that they were falling, it would seem as if they were about to commune and exchange shards.

But this is no communion.

 _Sacrifice. Apology._

The impact is far faster, far harder than it ever should have been.

The entity instantaneously ceases to exist, its shards crushed into the counterpart's. Unlike the counterpart's exchange with the smaller third, there is no protection for the core shards of either of them. No saving those _absolutely vital things_ from grinding against each other, from warping and melding through friction and the sheer _heat_ of the energy generated upon collision. No retaining the purity of the shards that had not changed since the beginning, those that defined their very existence, that all of their species shared.

That day, the Warrior and the Thinker died.

* * *

A young girl, no more than ten and two, woke, her body a mess, but her mind lucid.

Three days. Three days since the monsters had started appearing. No, since people had started becoming monsters. Since others had started gaining abilities that no man should have.

They had left, she and her uncle, their village splintering and scattering into the wilderness that they never would have normally braved.

Especially not with the wolves this year being so fearless.

But there was security in being alone, despite the danger, when friend or family could become an unrecognizable horror at any moment.

There was that disgusting taste of vomit in her mouth, and her stomach felt like it had been hit with a block as she sat up and spat to the side of her, her saliva landing on the hard ground next to her bed inside the tent.

One step to help with the pain.

Swear.

The girl snorted, her hair falling forward over her shoulders and curtaining her face as she leaned forward, trying to reduce the remaining sense of nausea.

Still, she had succeeded. She remembered.

She remembered the impossibly giant _thing_ , that massive yet somehow beautiful creature swimming through the stars, that godling beast.

She remembered its intention, its concepts, for it did not have something so simple as _feelings_ or _desires_ or _plans_.

It reminded her of the mushrooms she had once found on a tree and showed her grandfather, who had scowled at them. When she had asked why, he explained that they would kill the tree, only for the sake of releasing spores and making more of themselves.

Just like those mushrooms, this _thing_ would consume her world, all the worlds, to spawn its children before going off to do it again, and again, and again.

If she just knew where to find–

Twenty-two steps.

The cold sweat that had covered her when she woke up returned, her blood chilling.

 _What about killing them?_

Zero.

The girl froze. _What?_

It wasn't that there was anything wrong, or missing, or blocking her, she could feel it. It was the same as when she had needed to remember, that same clarity.

And it wasn't just zero steps, but it was also a sense of completion. As if not only was there nothing to be done to achieve the task, it had already been completed.

Maybe she had asked the wrong question?

 _How would I destroy the godlings?_

Zero steps. Completed.

 _How do I make it so they're not a threat?_

Zero steps. Completed.

The girl blinked.

"Forta, you're awake." She looked over at the entrance to the tent, her uncle entering. He stayed away though, keeping distance, which she noticed and felt slightly hurt by. "You were possessed by a madness. Is it over?"

"I-I," she started, her voice scratchy and hurting. She lifted a hand to her throat as she swallowed, trying to clear it. "I… yes. I think so."

He nodded, moving closer. "You moved like you weren't yourself, like there was someone else in you. Got past Ruggero and me like we weren't even there."

"I- Yes. I remember," she said hesitantly, remembering what it had felt like, like she had surrendered herself to another. There was so much more, though. The godlings, the reason behind the monster, but she didn't know how to explain–

Sixty-two steps.

No, she _could_ explain.

Fortuna frowned, her brows furrowing.

Could she save everyone? Save her home, save the monsters?

Eight hundred twenty-eight steps.

A veritable script of words and actions and motions, instantly provided and detailed to perfection. She knew them all, could see them like her own thoughts.

Saving all those affected, and explaining everything to her uncle?

Four thousand, nine hundred fifty-six.

She hesitated, but only for a moment. And then she committed, dipping into the stream and allowing the steps to take their course.

Fortuna turned to look her uncle in the eyes, and opened her mouth to speak.

* * *

Purple lightning screamed through the air, snapping and cracking from dark clouds overhead, above a mountain of crystal and starmetal and flesh the likes of which had never been seen.

Even now it still shifted, pieces pulled inwards as tightly as possible, like some instinctual reaction to the sort of massive damage sustained.

Holes, gaps in the very air surrounded it, all manner of images visible through the strange openings. Green grass, dark sky, burning plains, cracked soil, forests, and even one that sparkling clear blue-green water _poured_ out of.

The size of the mountain was inestimable just from looking, too tall and wide, easily covering hundreds of miles in any direction.

Parts moved independently of others, as if each had a mind of its own, but that only served to worsen the situation, as sections were crushed and fused together from the sheer pressure exerted by themselves. Other places, though, seemed to act more intelligently, stopping as soon as a fragment came into contact with another.

Each part was only a piece of a whole, and yet wholly separate as well. In the face of catastrophic failure, they fell back to their core function, to the last instructions and intentions, blindly attempting to recover and fulfill their purpose.

Swathes of bedrock and debris became glass. Others froze, the energy leeched out of the surroundings so completely that the temperature neared absolute zero.

In other areas, shapes twisted and formed, crystal and metal merging in on itself and trying to heal and repair. And in one particular place, the structure stretched and rippled, more easily recognizable parts emerging from the surface.

Pulsating aorta and gasping lungs. Fingers and hands extending to wave in an imaginary breeze. Pale skin folding and stretching. The dip of a neck, curve of a woman's side. The swell of breasts placed next to ankles and the hollow of a collarbone. Soft sounds permeated the area. Quiet, constant easy breaths and hushed whispers. The rustle of hair and skin brushing skin.

Only one warped surface was free of any obvious change, at the heart of it all, and even that began to deform. A slow bulge that extended, depressions below it. A hard point and softer flesh.

A face.

It moved painfully slow, as if unsure and constantly second-guessing itself. But slowly, the face became a head, long, dark silky hair trailing behind. A neck followed, shoulders, a torso.

Arms, waist, legs, became defined over the course of many hours, until finally, after nearly a full rotation of the planet, the figure fell to the ground.

The first breath was little more than a frantic gasp, eyes flashing open and revealing shockingly green eyes. Almost immediately, sweat broke out on pale skin, the sweltering heat instantly taking hold.

The figure coughed and reached out, as if searching for something.

Without warning, a gap opened up beneath it and the figure tumbled forward, unable to keep from falling face-first onto hard cement with such force that the crack of skull against concrete was clearly audible.

The gap was instantly gone, blood flowing freely and staining the cement a dark red, the figure unmoving, with the only sign of life being the constant in-out of its chest.

* * *

The figure woke slowly, a dull, unusual sensation pounding in its head. Its eyes fluttered slowly, hazy as they worked to adapt to the harsh light. Still, they darted around, taking in the bare white walls and the yellow curtain on the left.

A yellow curtain that was abruptly drawn aside by an older man wearing thick glasses.

"Ah. Yes. Excellent. Good afternoon, my dear."

 _Good afternoon → my dear._

With an almost painful effort, crystal screeching against crystal, a shard fragment slotted into place, tattered connections forming between jagged edges.

Language and culture was suddenly available, and with it, understanding of the previous auditory communication and the ability to respond.

"H-hello."

The figure frowned at the sounds it had made. There was something off about it, but the problem was not obvious.

"Now, perhaps you might be able to tell me how a young lady such as yourself managed to end up without a single scrap of clothing on and such a nasty hit to the head?"

Young lady?

Was that what she was?

She took stock of herself and came to the conclusion that yes, that was a proper description.

"I… don't know."

She didn't. Everything was off. It was all strange. Like she should know, but couldn't. Like she should be able to reach for the information, but it was just out of reach.

The man gave her a sad smile. "I see. Well then. Do you at least have a name, miss?"

Another fragment crunched into place and then something was finally _right_ , finally accessible. Possibilities and could-have-beens unfurled, spreading out and baring themselves to her.

Brief segments of time flashed through her, barely snapshots, a golden man being the most common feature.

Her chest hurt when she saw him, and water swelled in her eyes, though she did not know why. A deluge of thought and concepts flowed through her, triggered by the visions. Realizations, knowledge connected and given context where before there had been none.

She was not like the man in front of her. She was something different.

She was not just a collection of water and hydrocarbons, but also vast networks of crystal and metal and fluid structures. She knew how to move and unfold and shift and turn in ways that made no sense when considered in the limited interactions of this world. She remembered the Two, the ones who traveled and searched, and she could remember swimming the stars.

But… she also knew that she was not them. She was not the Warrior. Nor was she the Thinker. She knew she was from them, of them, somehow. Both, yet neither.

What once had been two was now one, and the product was unrecognizable from the sources. They were gone, and she was in their place. She remained where they did not.

Some part of her was deeply pained, and the tightness in her chest grew worse, but she didn't know what could be done to alleviate it.

She only caught glimpses of that time-that-never-will-be, before the shard fragments sputtered, connections flickering and then failing, the scenes slipping away like water through her fingers and leaving her once again lost, adrift.

But one vision stuck with her, stood out among all the others, where the Golden Man was asked the same question the man had asked her.

" _Zion_ ," he had responded, and something in her felt different because of it.

It held significance.

She searched through the information available, through culture and history and meaning, looking to try and find a proper response for what the man had asked. It was important, she knew, and for that reason she searched and searched for something that would hold the right meaning.

And then she found it, and she _knew_ this was right, that this was the only correct response.

She looked up, meeting the man's eyes, and said softly, with reverence,

" _Moriah_ "


	2. Genesis 2

More tiny Entity!

* * *

 **Orphan**  
 **Genesis 1.2**

 _She looked up, meeting the man's eyes, and said softly, with reverence,_

" _Moriah_ "

* * *

 _Daughter of Zion,_ she named herself.

In this world, names held meaning, significance, weight, they provided identity, reflecting the one who held it.

She wasn't entirely sure if it was correct, but it felt right. It may not have been the best description of what she was compared to the Others, but it was the closest approximation she could find. There was no way to say "of/am both but neither, same but different, place-taker/survivor/progeny".

Choosing that name was a… a whim. A feeling. Yes. That.

She wanted to keep anything that felt right as much as she could, when everything else felt wrong.

In any case, they _had_ come before, and she was the product of them, so daughter was correct enough.

The man smiled. "That's a pretty name. Do you have a last one?"

She shook her head. Her name was Moriah. It was who she was. She had no need for others. And her heritage and ancestry held no distinct identity of its own. …Such a thing had been unnecessary to those who'd come before her.

The man's smile slipped a little. "Do you remember anything else, then? Where you lived? How old you are? Your parents' names?"

She had no answers to any of those questions. She hadn't existed, as she was, prior to one quarter of the planet's rotational period before the current time. She had not 'lived' before now. Age… age on this planet was measured in revolutionary cycles. Years. She had not experienced one yet. And her 'parents'…

 _Progenitors._

The ones who came before had not had names such as he was asking for. The only possibility was that could-have-been with the small core fragments of the Warrior that called itself _Zion_ , but it had not truly occurred and thus was irrelevant in the context of the query.

"No," she said, shaking her head again.

"I… see," the man said, his smiling slipping further as he adopted a thoughtful expression. "Well, no matter. We'll get everything sorted out, don't you worry."

 _Gratitude._

"Thank you." The words came to her easily as a warmth bloomed in her chest, not even requiring that she pause and consider them. It was odd, to simply react.

The man smiled again and nodded.

"I'll be back with someone who might be able to help you better, but for now the best thing for you to do is rest," he said. He backed out of the area, pulling the curtain closed once he was fully removed, and she could hear him walk away, leaving her alone.

…Alone.

She truly was.

Alone on this world, with nothing like her. She was broken, with barely a handful of functioning core shards and no immediate control of the organization of the peripheral ones she had nor any of the fragments that might be out there. Powerless. Helpless.

Water mixed with salts welled up in her eyes once more, but this time they didn't stop, instead overflowing and dripping down her face.

She was lost. So lost.

There was no Cycle, not anymore. Nothing was the same, there was no point of reference that she could find in the few fragments of the others' memories that she had. This had not ever been a possibility to be considered, and without any of the future-simulating shards or even fragments of them, she was operating solely from moment to moment, with no idea how to safely move forward.

 _Deviant. Anomaly._

She knew that something was different about her, as well. She was not like any of the Others who had come before, and it was a… a 'miracle' that she could even function in any capacity with the amount of damage and irreversible cross-contamination the shards she had had undergone.

What… what was she supposed to do, now? She had no idea. Perhaps for now it would be best to simply act as was expected and not draw attention to herself, letting her shards slowly repair and hopefully bringing back online some of those truly vital ones.

Yes. Perhaps that would be best.

She wasn't _terribly_ vulnerable in this form—at least to any of the locals on this world. The important fragments of the Shaper seemed to be working fine, even if they weren't entirely under her control. Having more shards online would only make her safety further assured. Still, the thought of losing this form filled her with… trepidation. She was not sure what would happen if she did. Well, she was sure that Shaper would recreate it, but considering the way her shards were acting she was very hesitant to test what it would be like.

She was missing so much. It felt like she was losing pieces of herself still, and she couldn't know what the pieces she'd lost were or how important they had been.

Moriah, the girl, the construct, the entity, stared at the white ceiling.

White.

Blank. Featureless. Empty.

So many associations for such a simple thing, and yet she felt an odd sort of kinship with it.

It made her curious. She wanted to know more. Wanted to _understand_.

She was so limited, though.

But wasn't that the purpose of the Cycles? Limitations to give rise to improvement, efficiency that could be scaled up and still function when those limitations no longer existed. Was it possible that the same could be applied to herself?

If she… had experiences as _this_ , limited as she was, was it possible that they would be useful when she was _more_?

She liked the idea. It had merit.

…Yes, perhaps she'd give it a try.

* * *

"So where are we going, exactly, Forta?" her uncle asked.

"Don't know. I just know how to get there," she answered, staring forward as she trudged along the dirt path in front of them, leading towards the northern mountains.

"Still say she's crazy. Godlings? Star-swimmers?" Her cousin snorted.

Ruggero wouldn't believe her without seeing it for his own eyes. But that was fine. He'd get that soon enough.

"I could do it myself," she told them. Even if she knew his complaints would end, they still annoyed her now.

Her uncle shook his head. "No. Not in times like these."

She huffed. It had extended the number of steps, but not terribly, and if she were honest, having Matteo and Ruggero along was nice in some ways.

In others, not so much.

But still. Her uncle had been good to her. He'd taken her in, given her a home when her parents had died to the sickness six years before, even while grieving over the loss of his wife as well. She'd had food a food and bed because of him, hadn't been homeless.

She'd found that there was a degree of detail she could make the steps have. It was uncomfortable finding herself doing things without any will, so she had reduced it to only the largest, most important points for now, which she was fine with. It let her act as she wanted between them.

"Tell us more about these planet-eaters."

"They are large–"

"You said that already," her cousin interrupted. She glared at him.

" _Impossibly_ large," she said. "If Terra were a mustard seed, they would be the size of Terra."

"That's impossible," Ruggero scoffed.

"That's precisely what I just said!" Fortuna told him. "What part of 'impossibly large' did you not get?"

Matteo placed a hand on his son's shoulder. "If there's anything these past two weeks have taught me, it's that little is impossible. I wouldn't have believed men could turn into monsters, but I've seen it happen myself."

"But if they're so large, how are they _here_?"

"They're not," Fortuna answered. "They're like giant pomegranates with an uncountable number of seeds. They don't need all of the seeds, only a handful of them. So they get rid of the others and save them for later. But some of them they send down, and they grant men powers. By the time they're done, they're small enough to fit on Terra. The monsters… aren't supposed to happen. But the godlings are dead, and without them, everything is out of control."

"How did they die? You never really explained that," Matteo said.

Fortuna shrugged, asked the thing inside her with all of the answers, and began relating what it was telling her. "One of them made a mistake, it was distracted and couldn't stop itself from falling from the sky too fast. The other tried to save the first by sacrificing itself, but they both died instead," she said. "We're really lucky they did. All they do is destroy worlds, and they would have done the same to ours within two or three hundred years of arriving."

"That's a _really_ long time," Ruggero stated. "We'll all be dead by then anyways!"

"Well, it's short to _them_ ," Forta snapped. "And I don't care if we're all dead. I still don't want the world to end!"

"Calm down," her uncle said. "You said they're dead, so they can't do that now."

She took a calming breath before nodding. "Right. But because they're dead, everything's going wrong. People are getting things that were never meant to be given. …Like me," she finished softly.

Matteo ruffled her hair, and Fortuna squawked in indignation, reaching up to flatten it out once more. "At least now we know you're not possessed. And if this… spirit, blessing, curse, can be used to help others, it's only right to do so." The dark-haired girl nodded. "I'm proud of you, Forta. Many wouldn't be as noble. Perhaps it was fate that _you_ were given this."

"…Thank you, Uncle," she said softly, her face warm.

* * *

It was frustrating. She had information, knowledge, but it was limited. Some things she knew in great depth —such as how she found her name— but others she simply didn't understand or know at _all_.

…Like what that round object on the opposite side of the room that kept clicking did.

Moriah turned to look out the window on her right, staring at the sky.

Blue. (450 to 495 nanometers). Clouds. (collections of condensed water, two hydrogen one oxygen, vapor phase). Cold front. (progressive forward movement of colder air). Dark grey. (lack of photon penetration, reduced light scatter). Cumulonimbus. (Thunderhead, slowly building opposing static charge).

Rain storm.

So much knowledge, but no… no context. No experience, no understanding of what these things meant.

The blue slowly disappeared, eaten up by the grey clouds. A repetitive pattering sound slowly started, building and speeding up as small collections of liquid water impacted the glass (silica, non-crystalline amorphous solid).

The random repetition was… soothing. Not like the sharp, harsh percussive beat of the round object.

Suddenly, there was a loud _crack-bang_ accompanied by bright light that made Moriah jump, her heart instantly racing.

Her hands were against her ears, blocking out the sound as it happened again, and the rapid pounding in her chest was more apparent than ever, along with the rushing of blood in her arteries and veins. Her eyes were shut, but she hadn't noticed or even thought about the action.

 _Acoustic startle reflex. Instinctual sympathetic fight-or-flight nervous response. Sudden epinephrine release by adrenal glands increases heart rate, raises environmental awareness and reaction speed._

She knew it, but she had no control over it. Her body simply acted, and she shuddered.

She didn't like it. Didn't like not having control. Everything was so… raw. So exposed. She knew that at least part of her thought processes were embedded in one of her core shards, but the actions and effects derived from her body, anchored as they were in the completely accurate recreation that had its own natural instinctual reactions, were completely involuntary.

But… this was an experience, wasn't it? Wasn't this what she had wanted?

With a great degree of effort, she removed her hands from her ears and opened her eyes, attempting to bring her heart rate down by regulating her oxygen intake and creating a positive feedback in her parasympathetic system from the easy, calm breaths she took.

But before she was completely calm, there was another sound of… thunder, and she jolted, but forced herself to keep taking regular breaths, lying down and looking at the ceiling, trying to suppress her action every time it repeated.

It was going to be a long day.

* * *

 **A/N:** So… I'm like 99% sure that this is the first Worm fic that has Fortuna's uncle and Ruggero as actual characters. I don't _actually_ know if Ruggero is Fortuna's cousin, but considering he was in their tent when Forta woke up after her trigger-vision faint and followed her first Path, it's either that or a doctor. And a cousin is a lot more interesting, because it gives me another character.

Anyways.

smoltessa is a thing. And she is adorbs.

Moriah's just a spacesquid trying to deal with crushing existential doubt, loneliness, and her body making her feel things she's super uncomfortable with. She really needs a hug.


	3. Genesis 3

**Genesis 1.3**

Dr. Mary Sartin sipped at her cup of coffee, sitting at the worn table in the break room at Central Brockton Medical Hospital.

"How's the mystery girl doing?" she asked, looking over at the graying man adjacent to her

Dr. Franklin frowned slightly. "I'm worried about her," he admitted. "Physically, at least, she is the perfect picture of health. Mentally, though…" He sighed. "Well, she is a conundrum. Well-spoken, articulate, and yet she struggles with the simplest things at times."

He looked over at his colleague. "I had to tell her what the clock on the wall was. It's as though a majority of her memory is simply… missing. Her entire past—last name, parents, address, _everything_."

Mary propped her chin on her fist, humming. "Complete retrograde amnesia."

"Yes, exactly," he agreed. "And everything that isn't missing is jumbled in some way. Disconnected. I even brought Billy in, but he wasn't able to offer any other ideas besides that it might be dissociative, but there's no signs of any trauma at all other than the very light head injury. Nothing that would indicate a reason for such a thing."

"…And we've no clue who she is? No matching recent missing-persons or anything?"

Dr. Franklin shook his head. "No. Nothing. Not with her age and features together, at least. Especially not with her name."

"What is it?"

"Moriah."

Mary blinked. "Foreign? I've never heard it before."

He shrugged. "I don't know. But she's very clearly a native English speaker," he replied. "And without any accent either." He looked down at his own cup in front of him—though his was half-full of tea. "She's going to be released by this afternoon. We can't keep her longer than twenty-four hours without good reason, and unfortunately 'amnesia' isn't good enough when she is otherwise medically fine."

He rubbed at his eyes. "I'm worried about what will be done about her. Perhaps more than I should be, but… Without any guardian, she's just going to be another unknown child shuffled into the foster care system waiting eternally to be adopted or to find her parents, and I fear what that may do to her, considering the stories that you hear." He looked at Dr. Sartin. "She's very innocent, and I am loathe to see someone like her have their first —in memory, at least— experiences of people be the sort of people you hear stories about. She's extremely bright and intelligent —when she knows something she _knows_ it— and to have that squashed would be a travesty."

The woman on his left hummed in sympathy.

"I just… hate to see things like this. If I could take her in myself —even if just temporarily— I would, but I don't think it'd be proper, nor would I be able to provide for her fully."

Mary thought, weighing everything against the heaviness she felt in her chest, thinking of her own daughters. If they were to be lost, if anything like this happened to _them_ , she knew she'd want them to be safe, in the best place possible, as much as she hated thinking about.

"Do you really think she's worth it?"

Charles Franklin nodded. "It might be a little presumptuous, but… yes, I do."

Mary sighed, running her hand through her hair. "Let me… let me see her and then talk to Richard. Maybe we can do something."

Her companion nodded, with a small smile on his face.

* * *

Moriah heard the door open, two sets of footsteps coming through before it closed.

She turned her head towards the source in curiosity. The first set she recognized as 'Doctor Franklin's, who had come back to her room in the prior day's afternoon (after the thunderstorm had passed) along with a 'Doctor Summers'. Dr. Summers had asked some questions that she'd answered, looked at Doctor Franklin, and then told her that she had 'amnesia' and got into a few details about what such a thing meant, mainly that she couldn't remember past experiences properly.

Which was technically correct, even if she didn't think it was in the way he had intended.

After that, the two had left, and she had been left alone once more for a few hours, at which point a woman had brought a tray of food and small box of liquid to her.

She didn't bother to tell them that giving her food was unnecessary, because she wasn't sure it _was_.

So she ate the food and decided that textures were weird and flavors were interesting.

Now, _sleeping_.

Sleeping had been… odd.

She'd found herself becoming progressively more lethargic after the planet's star had set and the sky had darkened, and eventually her eyes had shut, her body succumbing to the state without any warning. Yet, while she had slept, it was as though she were disconnected, in some way. Aware, yet not. Shards still worked, still acted, and the 'she' that was rooted in flesh paradoxically became both dormant and hyper-aware, giving rise to an odd state much closer to what was in the memories of the ones-that-came-before. But still everything felt inexplicably _less_ without the constructed body, without the influence that came from it. She was not _Moriah-the-whole_ , but merely _that-which-remains_.

As it was, there was at least the ability to comprehend that there was something distinctly _off_ with the way in which there had been a fervent latching-onto and association with certain concepts. Primarily exhibited in the immediate adoption of a name and gendered terms, and their indiscriminate usage even (or perhaps _especially_ ) when such things were totally irrelevant.

Ultimately, however, all of that was inconsequential in the face of all the catastrophic damage that had to be addressed. Unfortunately there was little that _could_ be done other than encourage self-healing, and hoping that as shards did, more connections and shards would become available until there was access to those dedicated to repair and able to assist in recovery.

An exercise in waiting.

Waking up had also been an odd experience, but more in the transition from one state to another. A different woman had brought her a different tray of food, which she ate.

The next few hours passed in silence, eminently aware of digestion occurring, all leading up to the moment the door opened with the sound of Dr. Franklin' footsteps and another pair that was unknown.

"Good morning, Moriah." The curtain beside her bed was pulled back, revealing the man who'd spoken and a blonde woman who was wearing a white lab-coat matching Dr. Franklin'. "This is my colleague, Dr. Sartin. She is one of our resident physicians here."

The woman raised a hand in greeting. "Hello."

"Good morning," Moriah returned, nodding. It seemed that with each new person she met, she was reminded of her _difference_ from them.

"Dr. Sartin expressed an interest in meeting you after she heard of your situation," Dr. Franklin explained.

"The amnesia?" The people she'd met so far had appeared to be fixated on that, so it made sense that this wasn't any different.

"Correct."

Dr. Sartin moved over to a chair next to the wall, sitting down and looking at Moriah. "You don't remember anything?"

Moriah shook her head "No. Is it important?"

The two doctors looked at each other. "Well, can you tell me what you do know?"

The entity looked directly at Dr. Sartin, the woman seemingly caught off-guard with the intense attention. "I know why the sky is blue. I know how many composite-structure tiles make up the floor. I know how large opposing charges between earth and atmosphere create lightning. I know—"

"I really meant more about yourself… specifically, how you ended up here."

"Oh." She'd definitely misinterpreted that. "I was told I was found by someone who brought me here."

"But before that?" the doctor prodded.

Before that _she_ hadn't existed. "Nothing."

Moriah felt the capillaries in her face dilate and allow increased blood flow at the slight disappointment the woman showed.

 _Embarrassment._

"I'm sorry." She didn't really understand what the purpose of the apology was, but that was her instinctual reaction and it lessened some little tension in her.

The woman shook her head. "No, I'm sorry for asking. I'm sure you've already said it enough times." She offered a small smile. "Do you have anything you like to do? How about a favorite color? Can you remember anything like that?"

She thought about it. She hadn't truly performed any actions yet. A preferred wavelength of electromagnetic radiation, however…

' _Favorite._ ' A selection rooted in emotional response.

She constrained her search to those that were visible to the limited perception she had, and ran over them until she reached a conclusion, one that she decided was sufficiently pleasing.

"Four-hundred three nanometers," she stated, surely. The general term was… "Violet."

"Any particular reason why?" the woman asked.

Wasn't the whole point that it was solely an emotional selection with no reason behind it?

"I like it?" It came out sounding like a question even when she hadn't meant it to be one.

Dr. Sartin nodded in acceptance with a slight smile, before she glanced at the clock on the wall and rose suddenly. "I apologize for leaving so abruptly, but I have to get back to my rounds," she said. "It was very nice to meet you, Moriah."

Dr. Franklin smiled genially from his place by the curtain.

"…Thank you." When the woman looked back, Moriah continued. "For speaking with me."

"I'll see you again in a few hours, alright?" the older man said, and she nodded in recognition of his statement.

The two doctors walked away, talking to each other quietly until they stepped out of the room.

Moriah stared at the ceiling.

* * *

"Hey honey, how're you?"

…

"I'm doing alright. David Johnson came in again today. Threw out his back. Again. I swear, the man doesn't listen to anything I tell him. It's not like I can help him if he's not going to listen. And you _know_ why it is."

…

"Thanks."

…

She sighed. "Yeah, actually. You know the mystery girl Charles got assigned that I told you about yesterday?"

…

"He's worried about her."

…

"Well, _no_ , but nobody's shown up looking for her or anything. She's perfectly fine, and this isn't exactly a free clinic."

…

"Because she doesn't remember anything. _Anything_ , Rich. I visited her and she's like a blank slate. A kid. An extremely intelligent kid, but all she knows from her past is her first name."

…

"Well, we're hoping that she might regain her memories eventually, but there hasn't been any changes in the last sixteen hours."

…

"She's going to end up with a social worker and stuck in foster care unless someone shows up in the next five hours, and Charles is worried someone might try to take advantage of her situation and she won't be properly cared for. And… his worries might not be all that unrealistic. You don't exactly hear outstanding success stories coming out of the foster homes in this city."

…

"Look, I was just thinking, we could put her up for a month or so until her memory comes back. We've got the guest room, and it's not like we're hurting for money. She'd be able to watch the kids when it's harder for us both not to be home. She's nice and sweet and bright—"

…

"…She reminds me of Melissa."

…

"Okay. Thanks. Love you too. Bye."

* * *

"What's happening?"

Moriah looked between the two doctors curiously, Dr. Sartin holding a flat bundle under her arm and no longer wearing her white coat.

"Dr. Sartin has graciously decided to offer you a place to stay and to act as your temporary guardian in alternative to entering foster care, until you recover your memories and more is known. It also has the benefit of having a medical professional close by in case of any… unexpected developments," the graying man said.

The blonde on his right held out the bundle to Moriah, who sat up and moved her legs so they were over the side of the bed, creating an uncomfortable sensation at the rapid return of blood flow that gradually died down.

"I also brought some clothes for you," Dr. Sartin said.

Moriah reached out and took them from her, looking over the bundle. "Thank you."

"We'll give you a moment to get dressed," Dr. Franklin told her, the two doctors exiting the curtained area and drawing it closed before walking some ways away down the room.

Moriah stood up, pulling apart the different items in the bundle and laying them out. There were some missing gaps in her knowledge, but there was enough to know what she was supposed to do and logically how to go about it when she didn't.

Five minutes later, only one mistake (the direction of the shirt), and one struggle to get the shoes on, and Moriah pulled aside the curtain, finding the two doctors twenty or so feet away.

"Oh good, they fit you. You can leave the gown behind on the bed. Are you ready to go?" Dr. Sartin asked.

Moriah nodded, walking towards where they were and following as they left the room to enter a hall, the girl only looking back once at the first place she'd ever been.

"—I'll see you tomorrow, then, Mary."

The blonde woman waved. "Bye, Charles."

Dr. Franklin split off and went down the opposite direction of the hall from the two females. Moriah and Dr. Sartin turned left to go down another hallway, and then stopped in front of a pair of reflective doors, the doctor stepping forward to push a button next to them.

"The weekend starts the day after tomorrow, and I was thinking we could go out to find you some clothes. How does that sound?" the older woman asked, looking over at Moriah.

"Okay."

It would more than likely be best to defer to the woman in things she didn't know about in order to gain experience without making any terrible errors or misjudgments.

She was feeling the (current) loss of the knowledge and understanding from her cultural-data shards rather sharply. The small bit she got from the linguistics-based contexts was definitely not enough.

Dr. Sartin nodded as a bell rang in front of them, the two reflective doors moving to the sides and revealing a metal box. _Elevator_. The doctor moved in without hesitation, but Moriah paused as she was about to step into it, suddenly reminded of the vulnerable state of her body and the sorts of things that could happen should the device malfunction.

"Moriah?"

Dr. Sartin was clearly not worried, so she shouldn't be either.

The girl forced herself into the box, her fists clenched at her sides.

They remained that way until it stopped moving downward and they stepped off.

"I've already done all the paperwork that was needed and signed out, so we can just head home," the blonde said, leading Moriah forward. "My car's in the garage just next to here."

The younger girl was so focused on how many _people_ there were around her, moving and talking and doing things, that she almost missed the transition from building to outside.

It was… indescribable. Almost overwhelming.

She knew, intellectually, at least, that there was nothing particularly special. She had memories of similar planets and environments that were beyond comparison. Yet, they had never been experienced so viscerally, like this, with such emotion. And that changed everything.

"Moriah?"

The entity's eyes moved over to the woman who was looking at her, appearing slightly worried. "Sorry."

"Is there something wrong?"

She shook her head. "It's…" She searched for the right word, that would convey what she was feeling. "Beautiful."

Dr. Sartin's mouth quirked up. "I suppose it is, isn't it? It's so easy to take everything we have for granted…"

Moriah nodded, the other woman looking amused. "Well, come along. I'm sure there'll be more than enough to marvel at as we go home."

She dutifully followed into a large cement structure with a great number of steel and aluminum-based machines, moving along until the doctor stopped at one and went towards the front left side, producing a small metal obj— _key_ that was used to unlock the machi— _car_.

"You can sit up in the front next to me if you want," Dr. Sartin offered, opening the door she was in front of.

After a moment, Moriah simply nodded and mirrored what the doctor had done to open the door on the other side, managing to get inside the car without too much trouble.

"Seatbelt," the doctor said as she pulled a strap across her and fastened it into a latch. Moriah looked to her side and found the same thing, following what she'd seen. "Good."

The woman inserted the key into a slot on the column a circular wheel was attached to and turned it, a few skidding sounds audible before there was a suppressed roar from in front of them.

"The engine," Dr. Sartin provided, looking at Moriah, whose fingers had tightened at the sudden sound.

"How… how does it work?"

"Ah… there's pistons. And spark plugs. And it uses gasoline. Internal combustion. That's about all I know. You'd have to ask Richard if you want to know more than that."

The woman did some movements with her feet and a handled rod between her and Moriah, looking around before the sound increased and the whole car began moving backwards.

Moriah's hands immediately went to the bottom of the seat she was sitting on, grasping at it.

Once they'd moved back far enough, Dr. Sartin further adjusted the components and they started moving forward.

After going around a few corners, following the slope downwards, they emerged back into the light, the doctor deftly maneuvering onto the street.

Moriah's attention was quickly stolen by the surroundings. Towering buildings of cement, steel, and glass windows. The people moving around. The other cars similar to the one they occupied that were around them. The strange hanging boxes with multiple colored lenses in them. The trees that started appearing as buildings became less tall and spaced further apart. The grass that followed as they transition.

Before she knew it, Dr. Sartin was turning into a street lined with houses and then into the driveway of one. The engine stopped, the key removed, and the older woman's seatbelt was released, Moriah copying her to get out of the car.

The building in front of them had two levels. It was much smaller than the hospital had been, but she didn't really have anything else to compare it to.

Dr. Sartin moved away from the car towards a doorway on the front of the building, and Moriah hurried to catch up. The older woman was already opening the door when Moriah reached her.

"Shoes off at the door," the doctor told her, moving further in and slipping her feet out of her shoes.

It took a moment for Moriah to copy her, and they moved further into the house where there were faint sounds. Emerging into a more open room revealed a dark-blonde man with grey eyes moving around a set of counters preparing food who looked up as soon as they entered, focusing on Dr. Sartin.

"Why hello there, pretty lady. Might you have seen my wife?" he said with a grin. "Because she looks just like you and I can't seem to stop falling in love with her."

Dr. Sartin laughed, her hand coming up to her mouth. "You flatterer."

The man's eyes moved from the doctor to where Moriah stood. "And this is must be the mystery girl?"

"Moriah," Dr. Sartin corrected. "Moriah, this is my husband, Richard. Oh, and feel free to call me Mary."

"Well, hello Moriah," Richard greeted.

"Hello," she returned.

"Do you know where the girls are?" Mary asked.

"Upstairs, I think," he replied.

Mary nodded. "I'll get them." She looked over at Moriah. "I'll be right back," she said, moving back towards where the two of them had come from.

"So Moriah, Mary told me you can't remember your life?" he asked.

She shook her head. "No."

There was no life to remember.

"That's tough."

A muffled shout of 'Girls!' could be heard from the front of the house.

"Would you like anything to drink? Water? Juice?"

"Water. Please," she responded. Richard nodded and got a glass out of one of the cabinets near him and filled it up, passing it to her over the counter. "Thank you."

"You're quite welcome. Wish I could get the girls to be as polite as you," he said with a smile.

The sound of footsteps came from the hallway Mary had gone down, and Moriah turned to look at the sources. Walking in front of Mary, being herded by them with her hands, was a young girl that stood about five feet and a younger girl that was six inches shorter, both with blonde hair the same shade as the woman behind them.

"Girls, this is Moriah. She's going to be staying with us for a little while," Mary said, crouching down so that she was about the same height as the taller of the two and her head was between theirs. "Moriah, these are my daughters."

"Sarah and Carol."

* * *

A young dark-haired girl turned over in her fitful sleep on the side of a mountain, her dreams filled with monsters and helplessness.

* * *

 **A/N:** Balancing all of Moriah's influences is tricky. Also: More main characters! And they're even canon, too.


End file.
